Viking Never

Like many of us, Follett has a scenario in his head which doesn't bode well for the future of the human race. I'm a fifties child and grew up during the Cold War, I recall the 'One in Five' talks given at my grammar school about how to survive a nuclear bomb. Well, things have moved on a bit over sixty years and I admire the author's nerve in taking on such a huge task. I don't have any objection to the (slightly feeble) love stories but I did get fed up with the descriptions of what people were wearing - editors please note that apart from Abdul's boots this was mostly irrelevant padding. The strength of this book is in the dialogue between China, North and South Korea and the USA and including the factual descriptions of just what nuclear war will do. This reminds me of Nevill Shute's 'On the Beach' only very up to date and much much worse. And horribly real. A very good read.

I have read tens of Ken Follet novels and was very excited by the prospect of this new book. I read it quickly as I was quite taken by the subject. But after turning the last page, I felt disappointed. Without giving up any spoil, i find the book has a weak structure and is not very credible. It starts in Africa but the link between the African migrant crisis and the final conflict is not clear at all. We spend maybe a third of the beginning of the book in Africa with interesting caracters and developments and then the rest of the book has no connection to the African beginning and goes to Korea, China and the US... ! this makes no sense. Then the US/China/Korea story is not really convincing. Retaliating or escalating is the key dilemna but the balance between the 2 is not well laid out. As the book comes to its end, the credibility vanishes and the reader feals cheated.

I like Ken’s books generally - he’s not a great writer but is a terrific storyteller at his best. Not this time though. Unconvincing characters, dialogue that lands with a resounding clunk, a lot of writing that reads like a cursory first draft….I am amazed at the five star reviews, can’t believe they were reading the same book. And meticulously researched? Really? Not much evidence of that. I am interested in the reviews that object to the woke agenda. Not something I’ve noticed before but definitely in evidence here. All the strong and principled characters are either female or bme, whilst the lead white male character is a Trump type. Interesting.That’s not what makes it a poor book though. It’s just badly written. Might be my last Ken Follett.

This block buster from ken follett reads like a Tom Clancy novel . There are various characters and the story is multi layered. The central premise is a series of incidents culminating in a third world war scenario. Very enjoyable and readable but slightly long at over 800 pages . But good value for money from an author with a good track record.

Not close to the Kingsbridge or 20th Century Trilogy novels. It can only be completed (or saved) by a good sequel, so unless this has been written and published put this one on hold and re-read the 4 Kingsbridge novels especially the first three.For me a good start, nice slow build, but then from Defcon 3 (about 2/3 in) it becomes increasingly predictable. I also found some of the characters were not sufficiently developed for my liking mainly relying on stereotyping. Time was wasted on the romance between the CIA & French agents.I find it hard to believe that any President of the USA could be so stupid, but then again from what we have seen, maybe? No seriously any President of the USA facing such a situation would have had more dialogue with their Chinese and Russian counterparts, both formally and through back channels given that the latter existed, just as JFK did in the Cuban crisis. Russia was not mentioned once – unbelievable.Having read the book, I feel the need for a sequel to get closure, but for this to happen it probably needed one or two more characters; one outside the American bunker and another close to the President of China, so it may not happen. A mistake to have left four of the main characters in either Europe or Africa.I guess I am going to have to accept it for what it was, the feeling of disappointment will fade.